engleski

Large-scale research on Croatian high school students' conceptual understanding in mechanics

Large-scale research on Croatian high school students' conceptual understanding in mechanics has been conducted on a sample of 1676 students in their final year of high school (age 18 - 19 years). The instrument used was the well known Force Concept Inventory (FCI), a conceptual mechanics test developed in USA and used in many other countries as well. The average FCI result for the whole sample was (27.7+/-0.4)%. Students in high schools which specialize in mathematics and natural sciences (N=429) achieved (36.2+/-0.9)%. These results suggest that most students leave high school with rather low conceptual understanding of Newtonian force concept, well below 60% threshold, in spite of the fact that physics is a compulsory school subject in Croatia. A possible reason for this situation could be the still dominant lecturing type of physics instruction in Croatian high schools, as well as the too extensive high school physics curriculum.

phisics education; mechanics; conceptual understanding; Force Concept Inventory

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